


Sunkissed

by Melimelo



Category: The Iliad - Homer, The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, But it's there, Canonical Murder in chapter 2, Eventual Smut, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, I mean some men we'll call Omegas can be pregnant, Implied Mpreg, M/M, Romance, Single Dad Patroclus, Slow Build, Underage Rape/Non-con, between Patroclus/OMC, but there's no heat/ruts/werewolf shifting, in the first 2 chapters, it's not graphic, same - it's not graphic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 15:14:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29155653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melimelo/pseuds/Melimelo
Summary: As the murderer of his Alpha, Patroclus should have been considered rogue by society. But he was a prince, and so, when the judges finally and begrudgingly conceded that this Omega had killed his husband, he was sent into exile with his daughter.There, in Phthia, under the full authority of the king, it didn't take him long to meet Achilles, the prince Alpha and son of Peleus. More surprising still, it didn't take long for the two of them to become friends.As much as Alpha and Omega can be, that is.
Relationships: Achilles/Patroclus
Comments: 9
Kudos: 36





	1. He Gives You to Him, You'll Give Birth to a Son

**Author's Note:**

> I've had the idea for this fanfic for around five years, and finally decided to write and post it, in case anyone might be interested. I don't plan on this being longer than 10 chapters max., but I don't really know why I plan anything in term of length... Anyway, we'll see!
> 
> As said in the tags, the first two chapters (but this one in particular) deals with triggering themes. There's a "fade to black" at the end, but better safe than sorry.
> 
> English is not my first language, so sorry for any horrible mistake.

Patroclus’ lip trembled when they pinned the crown to his hair.

It had been his mother’s, the same one she had worn on her wedding ceremony, all those years ago. It was a tradition, that the mother’s crown would serve for the eldest Omega of the family.

Him. Patroclus didn’t have any true blood siblings. His mother had died giving birth to him, and it was the only thing that remained of her. His father’s new wife, on her wedding day, had rearranged the Queen’s room to her taste. Patroclus had been two at the time, with no memory of what it used to be like to carry him forward to today. Nor to soothe the growing mess of nerves swirling in his stomach, tightening amongst themselves in an unrecognizable tangle.

Thus, him wearing that crown felt strange, as if his mother’s spirit had been raised from the Underworld, as a gift from Hades for the day. He did made an offering to the god and his wife the other day. The spirit’s presence wasn’t more tangible for all that. No more than the servants’ hands pinning his clothes into place, wrapping the golden bracelets around his left arm, slipping the large onyx ring on his finger, or finishing putting the kohl around his eyes.

They surrounded him, their perfume and oiled skin making him choke on his own breath and want to run away, as far from them and all that getting ready.

He didn’t want to get married.

His future husband had only been briefly introduced to him a couple of days ago, at the turn of a corridor. It had been by chance Patroclus had happened on his father and him, though he couldn’t decide whether it had truly been chance, and not a curse. The man had been chilling.

“A good Alpha,” his father had said once it became clear Patroclus had seen them. “The second-highest ranking general under my command.”

And it was an honor. Patroclus knew it. The highest ranking general under his father’s command was a mentor of his father, older than him by a decade and with a couple of kids his own. When he would die, Agenor would most certainly take his place. Then, Patroclus would be married to the highest ranking general in his father’s army.

Besides, by giving him to marry one of his generals, and not a far-away prince as it was common to do as well, his father displayed for all to see how much he loved his first son. Otherwise, he would not have arranged for Patroclus to spend his life next to him, married to the man who shall become his father’s second in military matters in a couple of years.

“You’ve merely decided on being difficult, aren’t you.” It wasn’t a question, as his father was himself determined to believe Patroclus would change his mind with the passing of the next years.

And perhaps… he would. He was young, still, not even fifteen years old. Despite what Patroclus thought, he knew his father believed him young still. Too young to know what was best for him, that was certain.

“I’m sorry,” Patroclus murmured, lowering his eyes to his lap, and not in the mirror facing him. The servant at his left, the one who was putting the kohl on, tutted.

Behind him, his father sighed before standing up and walking to him. “Won’t I have a smile from you today?” His hands fell onto Patroclus’ shoulders, and he willed himself to look back into the mirror.

There, he met his father’s eyes. They crinkled at the corners, and glistened with the late afternoon sun seeping through the gap between the heavy curtains. His own glistened as well, though Patroclus had been holding back his tears since the past night. His smile looked wobbly but, just like the previous ones, Patroclus blamed it on the pins keeping his curls away from his forehead, the crown into place and the soon-placed veil as well. His father, rarely getting the occasion to see for himself when pins were concerned, let it go with only a recommendation for the servants to be gentle with him.

“Do try to smile at Agenor during the ceremony.”

Patroclus promised, though he wouldn’t be able to swear on it. The ceremony passed in a blur, his heartbeat too loud in his ears and the ground too hard under his knees to pay attention to the priest’s words, or the ones he pronounced as rehearsed, echoing the man who was becoming his husband as they spoke. Until death did them part.

Despite the man being at least a decade older than him, Patroclus knew it wouldn’t be for a eight of them at least, unless his husband tragically died in combat, which didn’t seem likely when one looked at him. The average life span was long, easily counting on more than a hundred years, the number not providing much enthusiasm, though. On the contrary. The endless string of years unrolling before him made him gulp uneasily. If Patroclus had been born an Alpha, everything would have felt different. He would have been travelling around, learning medicine or combat, or both- everything he fancied. He wouldn’t have been here at all.

He was carried to the dining hall for the party and spent it between his father and husband, stuffing his face with chicken, dates and grapes and drinking more wine than he ever had.

It was stumbling a little that he walked into the bedchamber on his husband’s steps. The door closing behind him quieted the room. They had stayed until the end of the celebration, and Patroclus’ muscles were sore from tiredness. He longed to just bury his head in the pillow and lay down, and would have done just so had he be on his own.

But he wasn’t.

He darted a look to his husband, gnawing on the inside of his cheek as he pondered what to do. It felt rude to just jump into bed without at least say a word to the man he had just linked his existence to. His stepmother had encouraged him to start getting to know his husband during the wedding night, and Patroclus had planned to, he had, but he hadn’t expected to feel this tired.

“It was a nice feast,” he said, as a way to break the strange quietness. “The chicken in particular was nice. I love chicken, it’s all I’d eat for the rest of my life if I could. Though I think I did eat a bit too much…”

He was starting to feel drowsy, even still standing, so he moved to the bed as his husband and he talked about the food they just ate.

He laid down on his side, facing away, once he had taken his cloak, crown, veil, pins, belt, shoes and jewels off, feeling lighter without all these adornments. Not that he didn’t like them but…

His eyes slowly fluttered shut as he distantly felt the bed dip, Agenor joining him and snuffing the candles out. Patroclus turned his head to his pillow and was about to mumble a goodnight when his back suddenly caught fire, snapping him out of his daze. Agenor had just crossed the distance between them and was now pressed against Patroclus.

He stayed a couple of seconds, tense, sleep blinking away before he forced himself to relax slightly. Damophon, his youngest half-brother, liked to hug Patroclus’ arm when he slept, too. It was fine. Patroclus had just not expected Agenor to wish to do the same.

It was all fine.

He closed his eyes back, although he had lost the want to sleep, and took a deep breath. Behind him, his husband hadn’t moved an inch. Yet his skin was itching with something, and Patroclus admonished his sleepy brain for its cautious state.

Everything was fine.

He just… He just… He just wasn’t used to share his bed with another man! That must be it. Agenor was taking more and more space with each passing second and-

Patroclus’ train of thoughts sharply halted when he felt a hand lift the hem of his nightwear. He drew in a sharp intake of breath. “Agenor?” It was fine, it was fine, it was all fine.

The man behind him grumbled, though Patroclus couldn’t say if he was awake or half-asleep already. He shifted forward again, one of his leg dangling out of the bed.

A hand fell on his hip and brought him back to his previous position. A small shriek escaped Patroclus’ lips as his eyes widened and he scrambled to sit up and push the man away from him.

“Stay still,” was grumbled near his ear.

“What are- You’re not supposed to-” This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Patroclus wasn’t a child, he knew what happened in the beds of wedded pairs.

But he would turn fifteen in a couple of days! He was too young for that. His father said- Everybody said so.

Everybody knew that, despite the ceremonial taking place as soon as possible, intercourses weren’t supposed to happen before the Omega turned eighteen or nineteen years old. Before it, the body wasn’t fully ready to give birth to healthy children. To consummate a wedding at Patroclus’ age was unheard of. His father-

“No one will have to know. No one will if you stay still.”

Patroclus pressed his lips together and squeezed his eyes shut. Yet he didn’t wake up. Agenor’s hand was trying to make its way between his thighs, and Patroclus wanted to shove him away. Wanted to spring out of his bed. Wanted to be sick and run to his father, or to a guard standing watch outside, to anyone.

He remained in place, however. His arms, his legs, even his breaths were locked and still. Pinned by an invisible force to the bed as Agenor’s hand slowly reached its goal. Tears made his lashes clung together and his shoulders began to shake minutely.


	2. A Mere Stroke of Luck

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's the new chapter!  
> As warned in the tags, there's a non graphic scene of murder around the middle of the chapter, though I'm sure the character won't be much missed x)

It hurt.

The pain felt unbearable and he… he… he couldn’t bear it, no. No, he was about to die, he was dying.

It was impossible. The healer and midwives urged him to continue but he couldn’t- no- he took them back, his prayers those past four months for it to be over already, he took them all back, he didn’t want it to be over, he didn’t want it to be out.

His face screwed in a pained grimace as his insides felt like someone had just set fire on them, the horrible heat pressing down and down and down and he wanted to push but it hurt. His fists tightened their grip around the pillows, his teeth gnawed further down the piece of wood the healer had given him, his little toe ached with a sudden cramp, distracting him for a fleeting second from the fiercer one in his loins.

Their requests and directions blurred when they reached him, barely audible through the acute pain as he felt another wave coming, building more and more in his abdomen before it would spread in his entire body. It had been going this way for hours already and Patroclus was exhausted and he wanted his father.

“Papa,” he rasped, his voice high from the pain and-

His brows furrowing, Patroclus paused for a split second, his vision turning dim as he felt something tap at his shoulder.

“Papa, papa, wake up.”

“Wh-at?” His mind hazy, Patroclus blinked his eyes open to his room basking in the early morning sun, his body painless except from his little toe and the dull pain in his jaw, his daughter staring back at him, her mouth pursed in a small pout.

“You were having a bad dream,” Melina whispered, sounding as puzzled by the idea as a four-year-old could be.

“And I woke you up?” Patroclus added, wiping sweat off his forehead and grimacing both at the thought and the similar sweaty state of his back. “I’m sorry, sweetheart.”

“I had one, this night, too.”

He nodded. It was the reason she had made her way to his bed, after calling for him a couple of times without him hearing, in the middle of the night.

Nothing as blood-chilling as his own had been, though, he hoped. She had come to him crying, but had calmed down after a long embrace and an offer to sleep in his bed for the rest of the night.

Patroclus guessed most parents recalled the birth of the apple of their eyes with more heartfelt emotion. His own memories were all the contrary. Pain, he remembered, and the icy fear clogging his throat, making it hard to breath on top of the pain. They would sometimes visit him at the most inopportune of times, never failing to send a shudder down his spine and awaken phantom aches in his entire body.

They had come at a renewed frequency ever since the announcement was made.

The war was over, and Agenor was due to arrive any day, now. Patroclus hadn’t seen him since the morning after his wedding night, more than five years ago. When he had waited, cheeks covered with tears, for the sun to rise so he could move again. He had found his father and told him what had happened, and Menoetius had been furious.

It was an unspoken given, that a too-young spouse would not be bedded on their wedding night, but instead a couple of years later, when they would be of age. It was almost unheard of, the path Agenor had chosen to take that night, while Patroclus had been only fourteen years old.

As a result, the man had been sent away, to go fight in a war with as little prestige as his new position of Alpha of the prince allowed. Patroclus’ father had hoped to prevent the affair from getting out of the private circle of their immediate family.

They hadn’t counted on the possibility of Patroclus being already pregnant at the time. It had been impossible to keep the fact a secret, then, and so Patroclus had been obligated to assure everyone his husband had only yielded in front of Patroclus’ own curiosity. Even so, Agenor hadn’t been asked to come back. And so Patroclus had went through his pregnancy by himself, and handled his daughter since the day she was born.

All was about to change, though he had no idea how much. The concept of Father was as vague for Melina as it was for him. His daughter didn’t know ‘fathers’. She spent her entire days with Patroclus, or the woman who had been her wetnurse, with her own daughter, Pelopia. The two girls were about the same age, and loved each other dearly.

The only real men she encountered were the guards or the domestics, when they would happen on them in the corridors, or her grandfather, when he would pay a visit.

Though Patroclus’ father behaved nothing like a father to her, always sneaking her honeyed biscuits before bedtime and away from Patroclus’ watchful eyes, in a way he had never done for his children.

The closest men she was related to where her two uncles, Jason and Damophon – Meleagor being an Omega, like Patroclus. Those two, however, in their respective prime of fifteen and ten-years old Alphas, couldn’t care less about their niece.

So Agenor’s return bothered him for this reason as well. As much as he had attempted to explain the concept to his daughter, it remained an abstract one as long as it was only the two of them.

To be fair, Patroclus didn’t know whether there was space for a father, between the two of them. he had dreaded Agenor’s reappearance in his life for this very reason. He didn’t want the man to intrude between him and his daughter.

She didn’t need a father. She had Patroclus. He was everything she needed. He was everything, her papa, and her father. He didn’t need to have been born an Alpha for that.

He didn’t need to have been born an Alpha to know what was best for his daughter.

And Agenor’s return wasn’t good for her. Patroclus felt it in his very bones.

The last few days, ever since they had received words that they were nearing Opus and would be here soon, Patroclus had been on edge, walking to every end of every corridor as if he were about to get stabbed when he turned it. It had reawakened the nightmares as well. Any day, any hour, any minute now, and Agenor could reappear before his eyes, as if the past years had never happened.

The last bit wasn’t exactly true, however. The past years had happened. Patroclus wasn’t fourteen anymore, but an actual, twenty-year-old adult, with a daughter who relied on him.

He wouldn’t let her down. He wouldn’t let _them_ down.

Every day was spent apprehensive, so every night that came without his husband’s return was welcomed like the first gulp of fresh water on a summer afternoon.

This one was no different. He had spent the day looking over his daughter and playing with her, but only then, as he put her to bed, did he allow his shoulders to completely relax.

Her eyes had been drifting close ever since he had begun the story, but he knew they would snap open if he so much as stopped before she was truly asleep. He continued, his voice lowering until it was barely a breath, his smile softening and his heart filling with so much love than it felt as if it were about to burst under the strain of containing it all.

He hadn’t believed his stepmother when she had sworn to him he would come to love his daughter, at first, having never felt this much adoration for any other being on Earth before. It had seemed so farfetched, that he would ever care much for this man’s child, but he had to admit she had been right.

Melina was his daughter entirely, and the knowledge sank more in Patroclus’ skin every day.

Once her eyes remained closed for good, a small smile on her lips, Patroclus leaned down and brushed a featherlight kiss on her forehead, inhaling deeply the residue smell of wildflowers in her hair from her bath, his own lips tugging into a smile.

The smile, as well as the relaxed beat of his heart, vanished when the door banged open behind him.

Patroclus tensed instinctively, his eyes roaming for a weapon as the outside air entered his daughter’s room.

“I’ve been told you’d be here,” came a voice he had hoped never to hear again.

But the gods hadn’t been gracious on his wish, even when he had prayed Hera for his daughter’s sake, thinking she would understand his plight more than her husband would, to no end. Agenor was back, was here, staring at him like straight out of his worst nightmare, before his eyes flickered to the small child, sleeping with a light heart behind him.

Patroclus moved to hide her from sight, still crouched by her side, his hand gripping the bedpost so tight the wood almost cracked under the pressure. Slowly, he stood up, his eyes never wavering from the man standing in front of him.

“I heard it’s a girl.”

The same displeasure that had crossed Patroclus’ eyes at the news flashed in Agenor’s, making his jaw clench.

Agenor had no right to feel displeased. No one had any right to feel displeased about Melina’s existence. The fleeting feeling that had only lasted a couple of days for Patroclus had been expected – no one in their right mind ever celebrated the coming of Omegas, were they girls or boys. Omegas weren’t lucky. They grew up and, when they turned thirteen or fifteen, they were sent away to live with their husband.

And then there was nothing the parents could do to protect them. Truly nothing. They were fully under their husband’s power, once the bedroom door was closed. Patroclus had been luckier than most. A prince, the first son of a loving father, and thus he had stayed within his father’s side, but his child would have a different fate. She was his daughter, the granddaughter of a king, yes, but once that king would die… Jason had his own mother, and his full-blooded Omega brother and sisters to take care of, before accounting for the daughter of his half-brother. Suffice to say, even Patroclus’ fate didn’t look so promising, despite his loving father.

His child had just been borne into the world, and Patroclus had already failed her. The world had already failed her. He had mourned the easier life she would have had, had she been borne a real boy, an Alpha while she had been sleeping by his side. Then, though, he had sworn to her he would keep her safe, and ensure her the best life an Omega could hope to live, no matter what.

He wouldn’t let any Alpha harm her, in any way.

“Her name is Melina.”

“Ah.” Agenor crossed the distance to look down at Patroclus’ sleeping daughter, his mouth downturned as if he was merely inspecting an annoying insect. “She doesn’t look much like me. How can I be sure she’s mine?”

The blow made him grit his teeth and something flared within his chest. Patroclus’ hands were still gripping the bedpost, his body between Agenor’s and Melina’s still sleeping one, though a bubble of relief hatched in his heart, making him lose his snarl.

It was true, though having Agenor’s face back under his scrutiny made Patroclus notice the small similarities here and there. Overall, however, Melina looked most like him. She had his dark hair, though its curled state had diminished slightly with the way it grew past the top of her shoulders, now. Her skin was tanned like his, especially since summer was reaching its end, her forehead wide and her mouth small. Only her eyes were of a lighter brown than his own, lighter brown he now saw came from a mix between his black ones and Agenor’s hazel ones. Though, with them closed, the man before him remained none the wiser.

Patroclus hoped it could always be that way. Please Hera, please Athena, Ares, Zeus, Aphrodite. Let it be another war. Let my husband leave his home for decades on end, and die alone, far from it, never to see her again.

Him staring at her as he currently was made Patroclus shudder in disgust. It looked to him like a slug sliding against the petal of a rose. He wanted the man gone. Without him realizing it, the years of separation perhaps to be blamed for this, his hand had come to Agenor’s shoulder and pushed him away.

Despite the rough shove, it barely managed to resemble a nudge, with how little Agenor’s body moved from it. The man did was an Alpha, a decade older than Patroclus at least, having spent the last five years fighting for his life in combat instead of play running after a toddler. He was taller, he was bigger, he was stronger.

His eyes immediately darted back to Patroclus, anger flashing through them and, for a moment, he looked exactly like Patroclus always pictured him, in his nightmares.

“Not answering, huh? I knew it. Your kind, you’re all more or less the same.”

“Don’t-”

The rest of Patroclus hiss died on his tongue as Agenor took advantage of his superior strength to wrap his arms around Patroclus’ waist and press himself against his back, his breath hitting the back of his neck. Immediately, Patroclus’ brain went back to that night, ancient aches in his loins reappearing, piercing and mind-numbing and he doubled over himself.

“Stay-”

“Not- Mel- She-”

“You think I care about your bastard? I’m not loo-”

“She’s not a bastard!”

After hoping Agenor’s gruff reproaches wouldn’t stray too loud, Patroclus ended up being the one waking his daughter up with his cry. He watched with horror, the world slowing down around him, as Melina frowned first, before her eyes opened and found his.

Several things happened at once, then.

Angry at himself and at the man behind him, Patroclus demanded to be let go.

For all answer, Agenor tightened his hold and pressed him further over his daughter’s bed as her eyes glistening with confused tears. He felt tears of his own prickle with both anger and humiliation and fear as he felt Agenor’s hand grab the inside of his thigh, pulling him further into the nightmare.

This wasn’t a nightmare, though. Not a memory that was slowly but surely fading away with years passing. This was very real, and happening again.

No, this wasn’t a memory, and so Patroclus could act. He could act, and change the ending.

Hands shaking, though he couldn’t discern anymore from fear or anger, his ears began to ring.

His eyes found Melina’s red and tearful ones, and he thought he heard himself choke “Don’t look, sweetheart,” because she turned her head to her pillow and stopped looking. Biting on his bottom lip to stifle a relieved sob, Patroclus’ vision sharpened.

As an instinct, his hand slithered to the spot where their bodies touched, the man behind him having started to rut against his bare skin, even before Melina had looked away. He grabbed him, and before the man finished breathing “yes” against his ear and Patroclus could want to be sick over his daughter’s bed, he tightened his hold and twisted.

The man let him go.

His arms jerked away and he howled.

When Patroclus whirled around, his teeth bared and his mind buzzing, the man was bent over, his face pink, his hands covering himself. 

“You bitch! I’ll make you pay for that. I’ll kill your bastard and make you-”

He hurled himself at him, the force making the both of them fall on the floor.

Without thinking, Patroclus’ hands wrapped themselves around the other’s throat. He squeezed. He put his entire weight behind it, leaned almost entirely on his own hands, one knee resting over the other’s sternum, pushing the rest of his weight there, and he squeezed.

He didn’t stop when the face above his hands turned more red than pink. He didn’t stop when hands clawed at his arms, at his face, scratching his cheeks and eyelids. He didn’t stop either when the hands fell on the floor, like the third Fate had cut down their strings, when the eyes rolled upwards, when the face turned blueish, when the skin turned flaccid.

He didn’t know how long he kept on squeezing, minutes or hours. After some time, though, the buzzing in his ears receded, and Patroclus caught on the small wails coming from behind him.

As if struck by lightning, he jerked to his feet.

Melina was still in her bed, not looking like she had promised, though her blanket-covered form visibly shook from her crying.

Gulping a new breath, Patroclus wobbled to her bed and, his hands trembling anew, slowly uncovered her face. Her cheeks were red and tear-striped but, when she saw him, she wrapped her small arms around his neck and clung to him.

Patroclus smelled her hair, feeling his anger abate the more he breathed and only his daughter’s fresh smell reached his nostrils. She smelled like love, and safety.

And she was here, unharmed, in his arms. It was all he needed. He could relax, now.

“Papa, who is the mister? What does he want?”

“He was a bad mister, sweetheart,” he said, his free hand moving up and down her back as her breath hitched again. “He wanted to hurt you.”

“That’s why he was screaming?”

“Yes.”

“I got scared when he started screaming.”

“It’s alright. He won’t scream again, or scare you again. I got you.”

“I love you, Papa.”

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I love you too. Come,” he added, lifting her up while making sure her face was buried in his chest, her eyes closed to the outside world and its gangrene currently laying on the floor of his daughter’s bedroom. “We’ll sleep somewhere else, tonight.” He would need to get her new quarters, but for now his bed will do. He’ll sleep on the floor for as long as it need be.

He didn’t think about the consequence of his own actions beyond this until the following morning, when a loud shriek waked the entire aisle up. It didn’t take long for the news of Agenor’s death to spread around the palace, and the town, especially when the first rumors concerning Patroclus’ involvement sparked.

No one had ever heard of an Omega killing an Alpha, furthermore his Alpha, furthermore in his prime, with his bare hands, and getting out unscathed. It was impossible.

Even Patroclus’ own father had trouble believing his retelling, despite the glaring evidence of the murderer’s identity, up to the same hand size the healer had found on Agenor’s throat as Patroclus’ were.

His trial however, as a prince, wasn’t a public affair, though not a necessity either. There hadn’t been witnesses – except Melina, but no one would believe her, even if she agreed to testimony against him – but it had been her bedroom, and Agenor had remained unharmed.

The second part of it took place an early morning. It had been divided over two days, for the peculiar nature of that one. To kill one’s Alpha meant death. Whatever the circumstances leading to it had been. Had Patroclus been anyone else, he would already be dead, surely.

But Patroclus wasn’t anyone else. He wasn’t just an Omega, he was a prince. The son of Opus’ King, the man who had traveled under Jason’s orders and became a hero.

People began to speak, to rationalize the act.

“Patroclus had been putting his daughter to sleep,” some said. “He hadn’t known about his husband’s arrival that night, had heard someone come near. He had thought of a mean-intentioned Alpha, out after him and his darling daughter, and had defended them without recognizing his husband. It had been quite a dark night, after all.”

“There must have been someone else,” others said, “in the room with him. The prince heard someone come near when he thought himself and his daughter alone, he had called for the guards, and those ones had struck without thinking.”

“It is simply impossible for an Omega to kill an Alpha by himself.”

Then, the healer had noticed blood coming from a wound, at the back of the Alpha’s head, and people had spurred a tale from there.

“The prince had recognized his Alpha,” they agreed on. “He was welcoming his husband back, embracing him tightly, with his eyes closed to prevent himself from crying from joy and waking his daughter. Thus, he didn’t see the murderer coming for his husband, and strike him. The poor one died in his arms, and left his handprints while trying to reanimate him. now, here he is, accused, while the real murderer is still on the run.”

The judges didn’t believe these tales, though. “A mere stroke of luck,” they called it. But a stroke nonetheless.

“Why can’t you tell them the mister was bad, Papa?”

Because it wouldn’t matter if he wanted to kill you. He had the right, he had every right to do whatever he wanted with you, as you were linked to him through me.

He kept the real explanation to himself, and instead explained through gritted teeth that Omegas had special rules when it concerned Alphas.

“Like how I can only eat one of grandfather’s biscuit a day while you can eat as many as you want?”

“I… Yes, I suppose it is.”

“But you do that because you’re older than me, you said so.”

“These men are way older than me, too, sweetheart.”

When Patroclus entered the court room this second day, a lump had appeared in his throat.

The judges didn’t believe him capable of killing an Alpha, as an Omega, and he was sure his father would never allow him to be executed for this crime.

Death wasn’t the only judgement one could pass on him.

He had heard tales, of bad Omegas getting mutilated for acting out, or having their children removed from them, to disappear in the streets or in brothels. A prince could remain a prince without one member, or without one now fatherless daughter. No one would care, or blink twice at it.

They would even consider it a chance, an opportunity to get remarried quickly, although a mourning period would need to be applied, in the memory of his first Alpha.

“Patroclus, son of Menoetius,” his name, in the mouth of the Alpha here to judge him for the murder of his Alpha, rang absurd. “You are accused of participating in the cowardly fight resulting in Agenor, son of Aphareos, your husband, death. As per your crime, you and your daughter are therefore sent into exile.”

Patroclus’ breath caught in his throat and his eyes widened. Exile? His heart skipped a beat. He didn’t know whether to be relieved or floored.

On one hand, Melina was to remain with him. And exile was better than mutilation or castration or living in the same place everything happened.

On the other, however, being exiled meant being sent away from his father, his family. Being on his own, with no protection but his own arms, facing the consequences of killing his husband in a place that wasn’t home. In a place probably far enough that it would count as a satisfying punishment. A shudder racked through him at the thought of who, exactly, would agree to look over a murderous, Alpha-killing Omega, even a prince one.

“Where to, my lords?”

His father was the one to answer, his voice tight and shaky, as if he were about to crumble down. “Thessaly. My friend Peleus, the king, agreed to look over you and Melina while I won’t be able to. He is a good man, Patroclus, and his son… well, we’ve only ever heard impressive feats coming from his son.”

The boat for Thessaly left the following week, and so Patroclus spent his last days home packing for Melina and himself, attending the Alpha’s funeral ceremony and following games, and trying to explain to his daughter what exile meant for them.

“We’ll live in another palace. We’ll have our quarters, just like here,” though he guessed smaller ones than they were both used to, “and we’ll pay our respect to the king there. It will be nice, you’ll see. We’ll go live in a city called Phthia and, while we won’t see the sea from the palace, I’m sure there’ll be plenty of other fun things to do there.”

He had read Phthia possesses a fertile soil, much more than Opus does, and so imagined the beasts and plants were more abundant and exotic there than they were used to here.

The journey to Peleus’ palace took several weeks. One and a half at sea, which was something Patroclus kept very fond childhood memories of, and two weeks in carriage.

On the morning of the twenty-fifth day, however, they crossed the walls of Phthia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There it is! I hope you enjoyed this second chapter!  
> Next one will have the meeting with a certain prince we know well, though I won't say more in case I end up spoiling something x)

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed that chapter!
> 
> Here's my [Tumblr](https://melimelo-ao3.tumblr.com/), if you want to talk! :)


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